


Not As Planned

by PrinxOfTheFlamingHeart



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, Wheelchairs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-29
Updated: 2020-12-29
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:22:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,667
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28406211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PrinxOfTheFlamingHeart/pseuds/PrinxOfTheFlamingHeart
Summary: Roman blames himself after losing his soulmate. Emile is determined to help Roman smile again, although they're technically strangers. But a stranger is just a friend you haven't yet met!
Relationships: Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders/Dr. Emile Picani
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8
Collections: Sanders Sides 2020 Gift Exchange





	Not As Planned

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AromanticAndAromatic](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=AromanticAndAromatic).



> Beta Read by PicnicsAndStars

In many ways, winding up at some hole-in-the-wall café on the other side of the park was the perfect microcosm of how his day was going. He was in a strange place, in many ways. Literally, he'd never been here before. Roman didn't even like coffee. It had its uses; in a pinch. Especially if he was worried about what the energy drinks he frequently used was doing to him he'd switch to coffee. The cup in front of him was something the barista recommended. One of those seasonal things that's supposed to taste like some holiday treat. Which had it been? Roman couldn't remember. 

There was only one real thought in his head. Nobody he knew had ever been rejected by their soulmate. That simply didn't happen. Even thinking about it that way seemed harsh. It had been mutual, at the end. The final rejection had to have the consent of both soulmates, although Roman had suggested any number of alternatives to simply cutting things off. How did the universe mess it up? How could a soulmate be wrong?

Roman turned the cup around in his hands on the table, his fingers itching to pull his phone out and call or text a friend. Virgil would care, he'd been so supportive when Roman found his soulmate. He'd been on the phone with Roman all night after his soulmate left. Virgil offered to cut his trip short and come home, he’d left with his boyfriend on a road trip they'd planned way in advance. Roman threatened to run off to his Aunt Patty’s house if Virgil came home early. Virgil and Aunt Patty didn’t get along, but then again Roman didn’t get along well with her either. After all his reassurances, he'd only make Virgil anxious about him if he complained now. Roman couldn't be that burden.

That's what he'd been to his soulmate. A burden. From the moment he'd seen his soul-stamp in the park, Roman had inconvenienced him. Mr. Soulmate was dating a girl who's soul-mate passed away when they were kids. He'd promised her his heart and he wouldn't give it to anyone else. Not even when Roman offered to be friends. His soulmate wouldn't risk even feeling positive feelings for Roman. Roman had begged, pleaded, bargained, gotten both of their parents involved and even had a heart to heart with the girlfriend. It had all made the soulmate angry. The last rejection stung the most, giving up. His wrist still burned a little.

He raised the cup in his hands to his lips and belatedly realized it was peppermint mocha. Also it was lukewarm at best. He grimaced and looked back down into the cup as he set it back on the table.

"My father used to say the darkest times call for the sunniest smiles!" Roman looked up from his cup of coffee and into a pair of eyes equally as brown, and a smile as sunny as he’d ever seen. He hadn't even heard the other young man approaching. “I bet you have a really sunny smile when you aren’t brooding over cold coffee.”

"You can keep the flattery. I'm not your soulmate," Roman said, dismissively looking back down at his cup.

A whistle from the other side of the table brought his gaze back up. This stranger had an eyebrow raised, his smile no less charming. "Yikes, greet everyone like that?" 

Roman looked the stranger over and hesitated. Something in the guileless look he was getting made him want to talk to this stranger. "I'm sorry. I'm not very good company right now.”

"I'm Emile. I've been told I'm good enough company for two people," Emile said, waving a hand in greeting. "How do you know you're not my soulmate?"

Roman bit his lip and tried not to smile at this stranger. At any other time the interest would be welcome. On any other day, Roman would have flirted back. Instead, for some reason he decided to tell a stranger his most painful recent memory. 

"My soulmate rejected me." What little conversation going on around them died. Roman sipped his coffee before remembering it wasn't good. He set the cup down again and moved it away from himself. “Yeah wow, can’t believe I just said that in public. Look, I’m sure you’re nice, but my heart’s just done.”

Emile held his hands up, both of which held cups of coffee. "Well, I sure shoved my foot in my mouth. I’m sorry. If you’d like I can go. I did get you a new coffee, but I totally understand if you’d rather not.”

Roman waited a beat but instead of shooing Emile away, he reached for the cup of coffee, leaned onto his elbows and sipped it. “Look, this is excellent coffee but I don’t want to bring you down with my problems.”

Emile waved his free hand. “I’m sure it’s a Wonderland of a mess, but now that I’ve jumped down this rabbit hole, let me try and dig our way out. What do you say, Alice?”

“My name’s Roman.”

Emile’s megawatt smile got even brighter and Roman found the corners of his mouth twitching. 

“Roman, before you call it done-zo on your heart, maybe we should make sure it was your actual soulmate?" Emile asked. 

Roman rolled his sleeve up. One palm up, he showed Emile his soul-stamp. A Christmas tree, star on top, now sporting a red X through it. His eyes misted over as he remembered the pain of that red X appearing. He felt rather than saw Emile's hand land on his upturned palm. His soul-stamp was a five-pointed yellow star with a red X over it. 

Roman's breath hitched. "S-so I'm not alone?" 

He hated himself instantly at how raw he sounded. He'd never heard of someone being rejected. A soulmate’s death made the soul-stamp disappear over time. 

Emile nodded, turning his hand over to hold onto Roman's wrist. "Let's go for a walk, pardon the phrase."

Roman quirked an eyebrow at that, but stood up and waited for Emile to do the same. Instead, he glided around the table, seated in a wheelchair. Roman was struck for a moment, and Emile giggled. "You really were stuck in your own head, weren't you?"

"I'm sorry," Roman started.

Emile shook his head. "No, I remember how I felt when I first saw someone in a wheelchair. Felt like Aang meeting Teo. Come on, I'll get the door."

“Was that a Last Airbender…” Roman trailed off as he actually had to hurry to keep up. "Um, are you sure..."

Before he could even get the sentence out, Emile had the door open and was gesturing Roman through. "First rule. Don't underestimate what I can and can't do."

Roman nodded as he stepped outside. "Fair enough." 

Emile led him to the park. The slight nip in the air felt good. Pulling alongside a bench, Emile reached over and patted on it. Roman obliged, sitting next to Emile with a shy grin. Catching himself, Roman turned away and exhaled. 

"Okay. Would you like to share or would you like me to share my story?" Emile asked. 

Roman shrugged. "Is it right to lay all this on a stranger? Let alone someone...like you. I'm sure my problems would seem like small potatoes compared..."

"Ah! Rule one," Emile chided.

Roman scrunched his nose. "What? Oh! I'm so sorry, that came out wrong didn't it? I'm just trying to say you've gone through more than I have."

Emile snorted. "I don't agree. I've gone through something different from you, true. But I've also gone through something you have as well." Emile waved his crossed-out stamp at him cheerfully. 

"Oh. Right." Looking down, Roman rubbed a thumb over his own stamp. 

Emile reached over and covered the stamp with his own hand. "I was in an accident. Car accident. Had to use the jaws of life to get me out of what was left of my car. My...my soulmate, Henry, sat at my bedside until the doctor said that I'd never walk again. That it was likely I'd lose all motor control from the neck down. That's when it became too much for him. He left me. Left me in a hospital bed. My mother was sure I'd die of grief if the operations failed to kill me."

Roman sat back, biting his lower lip. "That's...awful. But you didn't! And you weren’t…well, at least not as bad as they thought!"

Emile sighed. "Yeah, turns out doctors tend to go with the worst case scenario. Plan for the worst, hope for the best. By the time I could move my arms again, the X was already over our mark. I don't know if he even knows what my condition turned out to be. Not that it changes anything for me. I wouldn't take Henry back. I deserve better."

Roman's mouth dropped open. "But...but he’s your soulmate!"

Emile shrugged. "Not anymore. Among the many therapy groups I went through, there was one for people who'd gone through rejection. One of my group members got remarried to their soul mate after their first divorce, but the X stayed. They stayed together another year before they got another divorce. Once rejected, the bond breaks."

"So, I'm just going to be alone forever then." Roman ran his hands through his hair.

Emile wheeled around until he sat across from Roman. "You could be. Or you could be like my group leader. She got married to a man whose soulmate passed away."

The possibility excited Roman. He sat forward, suddenly eager. "Did he become her soulmate? Did her stamp change? Did a new stamp show up on his wrist?"

Emile's smile twisted for a moment and he heaved a sigh. "No and no. But he was her husband and they were, and still are, very much in love."

Roman sat back again. "But..."

Emile interrupted. "One of my friends once told me that having a soulmate is just different than finding your own love. A soulmate is someone made for you, but your own love is one you make for yourself. And who knows your heart better than yourself? The universe?"

"God?" Roman asked.

"Are you religious, Roman?" Emile asked, eyes catching his gaze again, as if they could see into his head.

"I believe in God," he replied. "But, not the same way I was raised."

Emile nodded. "If you can believe in a different God than what you were taught, would it really be so much harder to believe that God could have, let's say, a fallback plan?"

Roman raised an eyebrow. "Like, what?"

Emile held out one hand, his rejected stamp clear to see. "Like Plan A is your soulmate." Raising his other hand, Emile continued, "But Plan 2 is you making your own way."

Roman snorted. "Don't you mean Plan B?"

"Let's not bring family planning into this." Emile said, waving his second hand.

Roman let out a shaky breath. His eyes went out over the park. Could it have been their park? If his soulmate hadn't been so stupidly obsessed with one person's sadness that he would inflict that on someone else.

"I wasn't perfect. When it sounded like Joel…” Roman faltered as he realized it was the first time he’d said the name since he was rejected. Emile waited patiently, his eyes communicated how much he understood what Roman felt just then. “...when it sounded like he would never give me a chance I reached out to his parents. His friends. His girlfriend." Roman let the tears fall. Emile's attempt at placing a handkerchief in his hand failed, so he leaned in to dab at Roman's cheeks himself.

"Nobody's perfect. It sounds like you were afraid, and made some rather unfortunate decisions that only hastened what you wanted to prevent." Emile picked up Roman's hand and pressed the handkerchief into his hand again. Roman took it this time. “But I want you to know that this experience doesn’t disqualify you from being loved.”

When he could manage it, Roman spoke. "So I'm not...bad? Because my soulmate couldn't love me?"

Emile shook his head. "I don't pass value judgments like that. Do you think you were bad? Do you think you didn't deserve that love?" Emile asked.

Blowing his nose noisily, Roman belatedly remembered the handkerchief belonged to Emile. "Uh, sorry." 

Emile produced another handkerchief and shrugged. "No worries. It's yours. Well, it's monogrammed, but that was an old wedding gift, so I'm not very attached to it."

Roman patted Emile on the knee. Wincing, Emile produced a small bottle of hand sanitizer. Roman let him squirt some into his hands. "Thanks. You know, I tried to get us into soulmate counseling, tried talking it out with him but nothing could change things once I screwed everything up. I'm...terrible. Yeah, to answer that question, I do think I was bad. I showed him how much I didn't deserve him."

At that pronouncement, Emile's permanent smile faded for the first time. Roman kicked himself again. Of course he screwed up again. A wonderful man with the same problem had offered his help and Roman sucked the happy out of him.

After an awkward silence, Emile lifted his head again. “Have you seen Beauty and the Beast?”

Roman blinked at the sudden topic change. “Uh, yeah,” he said, awkwardly reminded of the pair of beast pajamas he owned. 

"Would you say that the Beast didn’t deserve love? ‘After all, who could ever learn to love a beast?’” Emile quoted. 

Roman's eyes narrowed. "No, I guess not. But he changes. He realizes his mistakes and learns from them.”

Emile nodded emphatically. "Well, the way I see it, you made a mistake, and you can learn from it. Call it your emotional car wreck. And you could stay in the wreckage, or take the help offered you and find a way to live past it."

"But it's my fault! I drove him away. How do I live with that?" Roman shouted. 

Every time he was sure that he wouldn't put up with him, Roman was surprised by Emile's grace. Emile held a hand out. He gave him the wrong one, but Emile shook his head. Sighing, Roman gave him the one with a stamp. 

Emile poked his stamp and explained. "The only person responsible for your ex-soulmate's decisions is your ex. You were in an extremely emotional situation and reacted badly, but so did he."

Letting go of his hand, Emile smiled. "And maybe he’ll change his mind. Maybe you'll be able to forgive him completely. Maybe that will restore your stamps." His words would've been comforting, maybe, except Roman was sure he didn't think any of those maybes were likely.

"That's a lot of 'maybes,'" Roman said, narrowing his eyes. "And what about you? Are you just helping a stranger? Are you my jaws of life?"

Emile laughed, and Roman felt something, a little twinge in his stomach. "I'd rather be your friend. I’ve found it helps to have someone who understands when things have gone so wrong. But you get to decide, I’ve imposed myself on you enough. This is your recovery and you get to decide when you’re ready. I sure didn't hop into a wheelchair the day after my accident."

Roman laughed. And, for the first time in months he realized how fake his laughs around his soulmate were. Hearing the real sound for himself again reminded him of something he'd forgotten. "I think I need a friend." He pulled out his phone, wincing a touch at Sheriff Woody stars and boots on his case. 

Emile’s face lit up and he pulled his phone out as well. Roman smiled at the Buzz Lightyear logo on the case. 

Taking Roman's number, Emile looked up and smiled as he sent a message. They sat knee to knee as Roman read the text. "Well, you've got a friend in me!"


End file.
